gambling

Child's Play

New study suggests gambling addiction can be predicted as early as kindergarten

Parents of hyperactive kindergarteners, beware! According to researchers from the Université de Montréal in Canada, your inattentive five-year-old may be prone to develop a gambling addiction later in life. And when I say later in life, I mean your child might begin participating in recreational gambling as early as middle school.

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The Score

Double or Nothing?

Confident a co-worker has a tendency to retain water? Bet against him on the Tanita Innerscan BC-350’s body water line (and then make sure he chugs his beverage at lunch)

Weight loss is a money making industry. And where money can be made, gambling will occur. So from pre-wedding bets to company-wide pools, people are putting the forks down to avoid forking over cash. As belly-betting becomes the latest fad in the health care industry, its critical to ensure winners emerge fairly and accurately. The results of March Madness pools aren’t calculated with a slide rule; nor should your weight be measured using the counterweight balance from 1974 in your company’s gym.

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Playing Around

Balls and Bullets For Bucks

While online poker remains in cloudy legal waters, betting on games of skill can still net you some quick cash—if you're good enough to beat the competition

We're happy to bring you the first installment of our newest regular blog column, "Playing Around" with Steve Morgenstern. Since his days as founding editor of Atari Age, one of the first videogame magazines (covering the hallowed Atari 2600), Steve has served as reviewer, industry pundit and even a game developer. In his new column he'll focus on the latest developments in the art and science of electronic amusement, ranging from game design innovations to intriguing new technologies to lifestyle and culture in the interactive age. Without further ado, here's Steve. [Eds.]

It's illegal to wager on online games, right? Don't bet on it! Our nation's lawmakers, ever vigilant against sins they're not personally committing, passed the Safe Port Act in 2006. The bill combines maritime-security enhancements, the creation of the Domestic Nuclear Detection Office and, in a spectacular nonsequitur, the Unlawful Internet Gambling Enforcement Act, effectively banning games of chance by making it illegal to transfer money to an Internet casino. Games of skill, though, weren't affected.

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Money Wired

What happens when a gambling town falls hard for the computer network? Hacker crooks. Megajackpot slots. Cutting-edge surveillance software. And that's just the start.

Kathleen Budz had been at the slots in the New York-New York casino for only a couple of hours when the big money came along. The Chicago grandmother was seated at one of four chattering Wheel of Fortune games in the Big Apple-themed casino—a rococo affair with a mock Empire State Building, Statue of Liberty, and Coney Island roller coaster.

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December 2009: Best of What's New

In our December issue, Popular Science names the 100 best innovations of the year: bombproof wallpaper, self-parking cars, the fastest helicopter, and 97 more. Plus inventor profiles and videos.

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